Shenandoah National Park – Friday, July 25, 2024 (Author: J)
After a fitful night of sleep in our vibrating room at Skylands, I woke up to a beautiful morning in Shenandoah. The park recommends keeping food locked in your car to discourage late night bear raids of your room, so my first order of business was heading to the car for breakfast. Our breakfast provisions were an assortment of individually wrapped muffins and donuts, instant oatmeal and cream of wheat in disposable cups, juice, and fruit. I carried a selection of items back to the room, used the hotel coffee pot to make coffee and some hot water for my oatmeal, and went out on our balcony to enjoy my breakfast.
The private balconies overlooking the valley are, without a doubt, the best feature of the hotel style rooms at Skylands. I had a peaceful breakfast with my dining companion, a cute little bird who was apparently accustomed to receiving handouts from tourists. Unfortunately for him, I don’t share food with birds – or anyone else for that matter. By the time I was done with breakfast, P and D were up and about. We decided that we would make our way to the Big Meadows area to see the Visitor Center there and maybe join a guided hike.
For anyone who is not familiar with Shenandoah, the park is long and narrow. Skyline Drive runs the length of the park. If you enter the park from the North, as we did, then Skylands is the first lodging area you will pass. But the second major lodging area, Big Meadows, is only about 10 miles further down Skyline Drive. Even driving slowly and stopping at outlooks along the way, it didn’t take us long to reach the Byrd Visitor Center at Big Meadows.
The exhibits at the Byrd Visitor Center focus on the history and development of the park. D was quite taken with the display on Herbert Hoover, who has a retreat in the park during his presidency. Hoover is, of course, remembered as one of our worst presidents, but “if he’s good enough for Lindy, he’s good enough for me.” At least, that’s what the campaign jingle they play in the visitor center told me.
We finished with the exhibits well before the start time of the ranger guided hike of Big Meadows. Rather than wait, we decided to ask a ranger for his advice on a good day hike. He gave us suggestions for hiking to summits or waterfalls. We made what, in hindsight, turned out to be an unfortunate decision to head for the water.
Given the amount of time that has passed since our trip, I no longer remember the name of the hiking trail that we selected. I do know that it was between Skylands and Big Meadow, so we backtracked to reach it. I also know that – after parking – we crossed the road to the trailhead.
Our hike started out pleasantly enough. It was an easy downhill hike on a shady trail. Because it was early in the day, there were relatively few people on the trail with us. Things took a turn when we reached a stream. D went down by the water to sit on a rock – something that he does as a matter of course whenever he sees water on a hike. P and I stopped for a moment to examine a hitchhiking bumble bee that had climbed into P’s pocket and was steadfastly refusing to leave. One minute we were laughing, the next P was screaming like he was being murdered.
“What’s wrong!” I screamed.
“He bit me! He bit me!” P shrieked in reply.
“I don’t think bumble bees bite.”
“Not! The! Bee!” P shrieked again as a second black fly bit his hand.
It took some time to calm P down, a feat made more challenging by my own panic (spurred not out of concern, but rather fear over what other hikers would think of my hysterical child screaming “No, don’t hurt me!” on the trail). In the ensuing panic, D was also attacked by black flies. We did eventually convince P that he would have to hike back to the car on his own power. And once he got going, he really went. We made it to the road in no time.
At the top of the trail were two barrier poles with a metal chain between them, presumably designed to prevent cars from driving onto the trail. P and I walked around the poles. D decided he would go over the chain. His first foot made it over without incident. The second foot caught on the chain and D pitched forward. D has a real talent for falling; his head has been in contact with the ground on multiple continents! This time, though, he caught himself with his hands.
“Why didn’t you go AROUND the poles!”
“Mom, why are you sympathetic when I fall, but mad when Dad falls?”
“I, uh, let’s just cross the street. Please no one get hit by a car.”
Back at the car, as I used our first aid kit to bandage P’s bitten finger and D’s bloody hands, I realized that we hadn’t even managed to find a waterfall.
It was now lunchtime, so we drove back to Big Meadows for a picnic of peanut butter sandwiches and potato chips. Then, we returned to our room to recover from our morning’s misadventures. It wasn’t until late afternoon that P agreed to another hike on the condition that we go somewhere with no water in a several mile radius. We drove to the Stony Man Trail (which is walking distance from Skylands).
The Stony Man Trail is a 1.6-mile hike to a scenic overlook. It’s a popular trail, but we had no trouble finding parking because those who had started their hikes just after lunch were leaving as we arrived. The trail was crowded, but not enough to detract from the hiking experience. More importantly, no injuries were sustained on this hike. Indeed, it was not until we returned to Skylands for dinner that D took his next tumble. How he managed to fall on the smooth paved trail between our room and the restaurant is beyond me. However, because his hands were already bandaged, his new injuries from the second fall were minor.
After dinner in the dining room, we went to a ranger talk in the Skylands amphitheater. It was a slideshow about nocturnal wildlife. In keeping with the theme, an owl and a group of bats fluttered around the amphitheater as the talk started. After learning about the sounds of Shenandoah’s nocturnal creatures, we went back to our room to turn in for the night.
“I hope the elephants upstairs have checked out,” I said as I turned out the lights. As if on cue, the shaking started.
Travel Monkeys 